Anagogic Qualities of Literature

Book excerpt: The essays in this volume deal with the relationship between belles-lettres and mystical and esoteric traditions, as well as with the methods used in literary criticism to reveal, describe, and judge these relationships. The term "anagogic" is used in this volume in a somewhat narrower sense than it is by Northrop Frye and, standing as a synonym for "mystic," refers to the doctrine of direct knowledge of "God" or spiritual truth that is attainable through immediate intuition, and it reaches from speculative Christian mysticism and Gnostic traditions to Zen Buddhism and Tibetan Tantrism. A cross section of representative examples of world literature demonstrates the different methods of approach as well as the differences in patterns, forms, and degrees of profundity between various traditions. Contributors: Gwendolyn Bays, A. C. Brench, Charles Davis, Wilson Harris, Desiree Hirst, Stanley R. Hopper, Mario Jacobi, Jose Maria Lugo, Reinhold Merkelbach, O.K. Nambiar, Pierre Ponsoye, Jo Sanders, Annemarie Schimmel, Eisig Silberschlag, Zdenko Skreb, Joseph Strelka, Izutsu Toshihiko, Frederich Willhelm Wentzlaff-Eggebert, Peter Young.